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Pyrex! I bought these! I love them! For the longest time, I've had a very large collection of plastic food storage containers. Allan and I have always brought most of our meals to work -- for healthy eating, for convenience (I'd rather not spend any part of my meal break foraging), and to economize. I also tend to cook in batches, plus of course there are always leftovers. Eons ago, when I bought all the plastic, I didn't know it was unhealthy -- that the polymers break down and enter your food. I knew plastics were bad for the environment, but I thought if I kept the same ones for a long time, it was not as disposable. Plus I commuted by subway to my day-job, with a lot of walking on both ends. Even if I had known that glass food storage existed (which I didn't), it would have been too heavy to carry. More recently I learned that all this lovely plastic has been leaching into our food for all these years. Yuck. Plus the containers have gotten old and ugly. I was torn b...

Thank you, Nanaimo! With all the personal blathering I've been doing, I forgot to write about something very  important! There was a by-election here in BC: a seat in Nanaimo would determine if the not-really-coalition government -- the balance of power a mere one seat! -- would survive. Translation for USians. In the last provincial election in BC, neither of the two major parties -- the NDP ( you remember the NDP , right?) or the Liberals -- received enough seats to form a government. For the first time in Canadian history, the "balance of power" was held by the Green Party. The Greens agreed to support the NDP, so the NDP was able to form a minority government. It's not actually a coalition, but in order to stay in power, the NDP must work with the Greens . To make things more confusing for Americans, the BC Liberal Party, which was defeated, is very conservative. The word liberal here is closer to the UK meaning of the word than to the US meaning -- not flaming ri...

When I was growing up, my grandparents and other older relatives used an expression, "Use it in good health," or a variant, "Wear it in good health".  This was said when you bought something that you were very excited about, or received a wonderful gift, or made a major purchase. If you brought home a new coat that you loved, and tried it on to show her, along with "It's beautiful," or "It looks great on you," my mother would say, "Wear it in good health."  Another variant is, "You should wear it in good health." The you should  part is a wish or a prayer, similar to the more formal (and religious-sounding)  may you . It expresses a desire. In "wear it in good health," the you should  or may you  is understood.  Tangent: there is also a sarcastic version of you should . "Maybe the Democrats will grow spines and vote against this war." "You should live so long." This is roughly equivalent to he...

Add this to the list of things I said I'd never do, along with colour my hair and move to the west coast while my mother is alive. My hair, once a lovely honey blond, became a drab brown. My mom moved to the west coast first! And we need a bigger vehicle that can handle rural road conditions. And so, we own an SUV. In 22 years in New York City, I didn't own a car at all. We bought a new hatchback wagon in 2005 and a well-used compact in 2017. And yesterday we bought a big thing: a 2014 Mitsubishi Outlander with two sets of tires (including new snow tires) and 88K kms on the odometer. As we were shopping, both online and in person, I saw that I really prefer a boxy shape, an SUV that looks more like a small truck -- Subaru Forester, Toyota 4Runner, Volkswagen Tiguan. But the car has to be in good condition and within our budget, and we didn't see any of those that fit. A 2016 Tiguan did turn my head, but the payments would have been a big stretch (who needs that!), plus the ...

Here are some photos of our town and the area surrounding it. Our lovely little rental house is an endangered species, a ranch, all on one floor. Excellent for my problematic knees and ankles. It would have made more sense to build the deck on this side, where there's a lot more space and still plenty of privacy. Instead, the deck is in the back, up against a neighbour's house -- which I'm guessing was built after ours. But these neighbours are rarely home, they are usually off exploring in their gigantic RV. And we are very happy to have a deck! Diego wants to play. Our street -- looking towards the cul-de-sac, the forest. Our street looking towards the main road. Note the mountains in the distance. Here's the view from around the corner, on an (extremely rare) clear day. Less than a five-minutes drive, we are in town. Here's my library! Downstairs from the Library is the Port Hardy Museum. They've been closed for the winter, but I'm looking forward to wor...